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The decay chain of 238 U is commonly called the "radium series" (sometimes "uranium series"). Beginning with naturally occurring uranium-238, this series includes the following elements: astatine , bismuth , lead , polonium , protactinium , radium , radon , thallium , and thorium .
The three long-lived nuclides are uranium-238 (half-life 4.5 billion years), uranium-235 (half-life 700 million years) and thorium-232 (half-life 14 billion years). The fourth chain has no such long-lasting bottleneck nuclide near the top, so almost all of the nuclides in that chain have long since decayed down to just before the end: bismuth-209.
All three isotopes are radioactive (i.e., they are radioisotopes), and the most abundant and stable is uranium-238, with a half-life of 4.4683 × 10 9 years (about the age of the Earth). Uranium-238 is an alpha emitter, decaying through the 18-member uranium series into lead-206. The decay series of uranium-235 (historically called actino
The existence of two 'parallel' uranium–lead decay routes (238 U to 206 Pb and 235 U to 207 Pb) leads to multiple feasible dating techniques within the overall U–Pb system. The term U–Pb dating normally implies the coupled use of both decay schemes in the 'concordia diagram' (see below).
Uranium–uranium dating is a radiometric dating technique which compares two isotopes of uranium (U) in a sample: uranium-234 (234 U) and uranium-238 (238 U). It is one of several radiometric dating techniques exploiting the uranium radioactive decay series, in which 238 U undergoes 14 alpha and beta decay events on the way to the stable isotope 206 Pb.
Uranium-234 is a member of the uranium series and occurs in equilibrium with its progenitor, 238 U; it undergoes alpha decay with a half-life of 245,500 years [7] and decays to lead-206 through a series of relatively short-lived isotopes.
It is transient in the decay chain of primordial uranium-238 and is the immediate decay product of radium-226. Radon-222 was first observed in 1899, and was identified as an isotope of a new element several years later. In 1957, the name radon, formerly the name of only radon-222, became the name of the element.
Alpha decay or α-decay is a type of radioactive decay in which an atomic nucleus emits an alpha particle ... For example, uranium-238 decays to form thorium-234.